FROM

The high proportion of young people ditching meat is a
'disturbing fact' for the meat industry.

Canadian burger chain A&W now offers the Beyond Burger (Photo: A&W)

Meat producers have cause for concern for the future as an increasing
number of young people turn to a vegan diet, according to a Canadian food
expert.

Sylvain Charlebois is a Professor of Food Distribution and Policy at
Dalhousie University. Earlier this year he carried out research showing that
2.3 percent of Canadians identify as vegan, with 8.6 percent of respondents
in B.C identifying as vegan.

Interestingly, almost 40 percent of British Columbians 35 and under
identifed as vegan or vegetarian, according to the poll - a result
Charlebois described as 'astonishing'.

Meat industry

Speaking to Canadian television network CTV News' Your Morning show
yesterday, the academic said the high proportion of young people ditching
meat is a 'disturbing fact' for the meat industry.

He added: "This means they'll become more influential in the economy and
likely they’ll be raising children the way that they’re eating themselves,
so that influence is going to become more palpable moving forward."

Reasons for going vegan

Charlebois claimed there are 'four distinctive reasons' people are going
vegan. "One is the environment - more and more science is suggesting that
the carbon footprint of the livestock industry is significant," he said.

"The second one is animal welfare. A lot of people haven't grown up on a
farm, they haven't been on a farm, but they do see nasty videos of people
brutalizing animals and that's affecting them as consumers.

"Third one is health. I can't remember the last time I read a study
suggesting that we should eat more meat - plant-based dieting seems to be
'in', or at least the scientific evidence seems to be pretty strong
encouraging people to eat more vegetable proteins.

"Lastly, there is price. Vegetable proteins are in fact cheaper."

Concern

Describing this trend of people moving away from meat as a 'source of
concern for the meat industry', Charlebois said, but he added that he's been
meeting a lot of meat producers around Canada, and that he's not 'entirely
sure the industry appreciates what's happening'.

"They're trying to figure out different ways," he said, "but as soon as you
see major chains offering vegetarian solutions to consumers - burger chains
[like major outlet A&W which recently launched the Beyond Burger] - that's a
concern."

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